Larraine
Feminine · “From Lorraine”
Larraine is a duchy on the French and German border turned into a woman's name, and it made that journey without any woman in between. Most place names become given names by way of a person who carried them first. This one went straight from the map.
How old is the name Larraine?
Larraine first appears in US birth records in 1915 — 110 years ago. The typical Larraine alive today was born around 1948, making them about 77 years old. About 800 people named Larraine are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Larraine most popular?
Larraine peaked in 1945, reaching #1080 nationally. See the whole 1945 chart.
Lists built from the same records:
Where it comes from
From Lotharingia to Larraine
The story of Larraine
The duchy's most famous export left it at seventeen. A prophecy was in circulation in France before she arrived, that the country would be ruined by a woman and saved by a maid from the marches of Lorraine, and it was quoted at her; whether it existed before her or was tidied up afterwards is exactly the sort of question the sources cannot settle, but it was certainly being repeated during her lifetime and it helped her get a hearing. She came from a village on the border of the duchy, spoke with an accent her judges mocked, and was burned at nineteen. The name of her region became a French woman's name in the nineteenth century and an English and American one in the twentieth, respelled at the front, where the vowel carries no stress and no letter is wrong.
Meaning
From Lorraine
The place name comes from the kingdom of a Frankish king called Lothar, whose territory was a long strip between his two brothers' shares, and the name of the region is a worn-down form of his. So the meaning of the name is a region, and the meaning of the region is a man, and nothing in it describes a person at all.
How the name formed
- Lotharingia
- Lorraine
- Larraine
Related forms: Lorraine
Pronouncing Larraine
luh-RAYN
Two syllables with the stress at the back. The first vowel is reduced to nothing, which is exactly why it can be written with an a here and an o in the standard spelling with no audible difference at all.
Nicknames for Larraine
Moderate
What the data says
146 years of official birth records
The long climb, and where it stands now
The same years in position rather than babies
- First recorded
- 1915
- Most girls named
- 194553 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #1080reached in 1945
- Change vs 1986
- 0.0%5 in 1989, from 5
Rank is a position, a count is a headcount, and they move independently — a name can hold its rank while the number of babies behind it falls. Source: U.S. Social Security Administration.
Larraine in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Lorraine in French — same name
Larraines among us
people named Larraine are estimated to be alive in the US today
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Is it right for you
Questions parents actually ask
Fashion outlook
Larraine sits outside the current charts, and that is its own kind of answer: naming cycles can only date the names they carried up. A name this rare has no decade stamped on it — it cannot go out of fashion, because it was never in.
Based on 146 years of naming cycles. How we read them
The trade-off
- The sound is completely familiar in English and French alike and never needs repeating.
- Raine and Lorrie are two short forms belonging to different decades and different registers.
- The place behind it is real, findable on a map, and has a documented history.
- Lorraine is the standard spelling by a wide margin and will be written instead of this one.
- The name is firmly dated to the middle of the last century in American ears.
- It will be heard as Loraine and Laraine, both of which are also in the record.
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What they receive
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Larraine
Feminine
Frequently asked
- How many Larraines are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 800 people named Larraine are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How popular is the name Larraine in 2025?
- Larraine is rarely given in the US today — it does not rank in the top 2000 girl names.
- Will my child share the name Larraine with classmates?
- Larraine will almost certainly be the only one in school.
More L names
The most-given names starting with L, all years combined.
Linda#902 · Lisa#987 · Laura#379 · Lauren#401 · Lillian#57 · Lori#1721 · Louise#514 · Lois#1666
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Larraine? See the current top 100.
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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